


Just Another Brick In The Wall

by UniverseOnHerShoulders



Series: Prompt Fills [58]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Coal Hill School, F/F, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:13:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25286644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UniverseOnHerShoulders/pseuds/UniverseOnHerShoulders
Summary: Clara has a hankering to return to Coal Hill, but being back at her old place of work stirs up uncomfortable feelings for her...
Relationships: Thirteenth Doctor/Clara Oswin Oswald
Series: Prompt Fills [58]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/585397
Comments: 7
Kudos: 31





	Just Another Brick In The Wall

**Author's Note:**

> From the prompt:
> 
> _Clara wants to go back to Coal Hill School._

“Is it weird being back?” the Doctor asks, looking around in the relative gloom of the corridor outside the science labs. There’s a large, brightly-coloured display of the water cycle adorning one wall, and Clara can tell that the Time Lady is itching to correct it, but part of their agreement to come back here had been that they would touch nothing, and that seems to extend to arguing with the decoration.

Clara’s surprised the Doctor agreed to the trip, if she’s honest; she’d suggested visiting Coal Hill almost idly, and the acquiescence had come almost at once, with an ease that had made her suspicious. It’s been years since Clara’s been here; the students she’d once taught are long gone, and when they’d perused the staff noticeboard beside reception, each teacher’s name pinned up beside a smiling photo of them, she’d realised that most of the staff had too. She wonders if that was her fault; wonders if that’s selfish to wonder, but surely it must have made a difference; to lose two members of staff prematurely within two years could only be an ominous omen. If the rest of the names on the memorial wall are anything to go by, she can’t blame them; she’d felt strangely disconcerted as she’d stared up at it, wondering with detached horror what fates those who’d passed away after her had met.

“A bit,” Clara confesses, looking around the new building and feeling a sense of vague unease in response to the minimalist colour scheme. This hadn’t been here in her day; it’s modern, yes, but cold and clinical and entirely unlikely the bright, spacious and slightly-dilapidated building the English classrooms are in. She wonders how the school had secured the funding for it; wonders what had been wrong with the old buildings… other than the dodgy heating and the windows that wouldn’t open and the poor acoustics. Still, they’d had charm. “It’s… sort of familiar, but unfamiliar.”

“Like leaving a room and finding all the furniture rearranged.”

“A bit, yeah,” Clara offers the Doctor a tight smile, grateful that she understands. “How did you…”

“Did that a few times at school,” the Doctor admits with a grin. “And I can read you like a book.”

“Right. Yeah. Of course you can. Makes sense. Makes…”

She feels overwhelmed. It’s strange to be back here and be reminded of the life she had been forced to leave behind when she had taken Rigsy’s chronolock and first died, before being resurrected at the hands of the Time Lords and trapped between two heartbeats. It’s uncomfortable to be confronted with the familiar and the unfamiliar aspects of the building; the normality of it all; the mundanity of her former life; and she feels a deep-rooted sense of sadness welling up in her chest as she realises that this is what she’s left behind; although it’s coupled with an odd sense of relief that she’s escaped the conventional, and it’s this relief that makes her feel a surge of guilt.

She’d loved working here, hadn’t she? Loved her job; loved her students; loved what she taught. So why does she feel so much relief to no longer have to come back here; why does she feel so much relief to have escaped the confines of a regular job and a regular life? She looks around in desperation, trying to find something to intensify her feelings of nostalgic longing, but the newness of the building means it holds no meaning for her, and she feels herself beginning to grow acutely anxious.

“You’re panicking,” the Doctor says quietly, and takes her by the hand, pulling her back to the present. Clara takes a deep breath and then exhales slowly, trying to fight the conflicting emotions that being back at her former place of work is bringing. She focuses on the feeling of the Doctor’s hand in hers; focuses on the way the Time Lady is smiling at her, and sucks in lungfuls of air, feeling herself calm a degree or two as she looks around and tries to focus on the small details of the wall displays; the scuffs on the edges of lockers; a long, black mark on the linoleum flooring. “Better?”

“A bit.”

“Good,” the Doctor beams, then adds casually: “Did you know I used to be a teacher?”

“Did you?!”

“Yeah,” the Doctor smiles, pulling Clara closer and wrapping her arm around her waist as they stare at an adjacent wall display on volcanoes, the lava illustrated with neon-bright orange tissue paper. “Not this face, but… I taught physics to teenagers for a bit while I was undercover, trying to investigate some weirdness at a school. I don’t recommend it. And I taught at an all-boys school, before the Great War, but that was… it was… complicated. I was hiding. I wasn’t… me.”

“In what sense?”

“Chameleon Arch.”

“Sorry, what?” Clara frowns, the term unfamiliar to her.

“Oh,” the Doctor looks down at her with a look of surprise and a tinge of embarrassed regret that Clara doesn’t understand. “It’s urm… it’s a sort of thing… it can rewrite my DNA. Make me human… or… I dunno, probably anything else, as well. Can’t say I’ve tried. I might look good as a Silurian though, how about giving that a go?”

“You can just… become human?” Clara feels an irrational sense of anger beginning to boil in the bit of her stomach; a feeling of anger and jealousy and bitterness that is entirely illogical, but is fuelled by the strangeness and anxiety that being back at Coal Hill is evoking in her. She doesn’t want to feel like this, and yet she can’t help but think that it’s unfair to know now that the Doctor could do this; unfair to know that perhaps in another time, they could have spent their lives together in the normal fashion. She knows, of course, that they’re spending their lives together now, and yet the ‘what ifs’ are becoming increasingly all-consuming, and she feels her temper flare in response to the unjustness of it all.

“Yes,” the Doctor frowns, stepping away from Clara and suddenly taking great interest in a brightly-coloured cross section of a volcano. “It hurts though. It erases who I am. It’s… difficult. It’s designed for crises only. I had to do it; I had to hide. This family of aliens… they wanted my power to regenerate, and if they’d gained it… they would have been unstoppable.”

“Would you ever make yourself human for other reasons?” Clara asks, pointedly not looking at the Doctor as she speaks and trying to render her tone as casual as possible, as though they’re discussing the weather. Her thoughts continue to broil, and she folds her arms to keep her hands from shaking. “I mean… other than emergencies.”

“Clara, I know what you’re thinking,” the Doctor says sternly, shooting her a warning look. “I know that you’re thinking we could have had a regular life together, but you can’t… we can’t… you don’t understand what it would involve. It’s agony to experience; it nearly killed me to do it. And I had no idea who I was; no idea who Martha was. I very nearly messed things up completely. It would be like… having to learn everything all over again. Having to learn _me_ all over again.”

“I know,” Clara mumbles in a small voice, feeling foolish for even asking. She hates it when the Doctor does this; hates being talked down to. It doesn’t matter how long it’s been; it still happens from time to time, and it still makes her feel small. “I know, I just… _would_ you ever do that? Or would you have done that, if I hadn’t been… you know… functionally the living undead?”

“Clara, I wouldn’t know you if I did that,” the Doctor reminds her gently. “I wouldn’t know you, or Ryan, or Graham, or Yaz. I wouldn’t know who I was. I wouldn’t know that I love you.”

“But you…”

“I didn’t remember who I was before, and I didn’t remember the person I loved with both my hearts; I fell in love with a complete stranger instead, and while I did that I neglected and hurt my best friend terribly. Could you really endure that? Could you really ask me to go through all that pain, and then suffer through the pain of watching me love someone who wasn’t you?”

“No!” Clara says at once, folding her arms defensively. It’s hard to think about; it’s strange to think in what-ifs and could-have-beens. She feels increasingly stung by the thought of the Chameleon Arch in a way that she doesn’t fully understand, and after the Doctor’s unintentional patronising of her seconds before, she can feel her anger flaring in response to being spoken to with such condescension. “That’s not… I’m not asking you to… or maybe I… I don’t know. Alright? I don’t know. It’s just… weird, thinking about what might have happened if your people hadn’t, you know, done such a great job of murdering me that my name is on a memorial wall in this building.”

“Clara…”

“No, don’t,” she snaps, her self-control collapsing as her confusion and resentment and anxiety meet and the last vestiges of her composure evaporate. “And don’t try to say that I would have to go through the pain of watching you love someone who isn’t me, and that it would kill me, because when has that ever been a problem? When have I ever objected to River; when have I ever complained when I know you’ve been off with her, doing god knows what?”

“Clara, it wouldn’t be… it’s not the same…” the Doctor looks flustered, and Clara feels a sudden, bitter sense of gladness about that fact; let her feel flustered; let her feel guilty. “You know I love you both… but with the Arch, it would be a case of…”

“I refuse to believe you wouldn’t know me,” Clara says fiercely, folding her arms defensively across her chest. “I refuse to believe that.”

“Why are you getting so angry about hypotheticals?!” the Doctor asks with exasperation. “This isn’t relevant… you can’t die, and you know I don’t need to become human; know I don’t need to forget you. And no, you’ve never complained about River; you’ve never…”

“I’ve never complained about sharing you, even though god knows, sometimes it hurts to know that you’re with her and that you’re telling her the things you tell me… doing with her the things you do with me… taking her to bed and not me. God knows that’s hard to live with sometimes, and sometimes while I wait for you to come back I wonder how you’d feel if that was me; what you’d do if I was the one off cavorting with other people…”

“Go off and cavort with other people, then! I don’t care!”

A weighty silence falls between them, and the Doctor shakes her head at once, guilt etched onto her features, as Clara feels a swooping sense of confusion and betrayal.

“No, I… that came out wrong… it’s not that…”

“Fine,” Clara says in a tight voice, raising her eyebrows in a silent challenge, more stung than she can let on. “Fine, I’ll go and-”

“Clara, I didn’t mean… I just… you know I’m not monogamous! You’ve always known that. And when have you ever been? You fell in love with me and you fell in love with Danny; you used to flirt with women wherever we went-”

“And you hated Danny!”

“Because I thought he wasn’t good enough for you, until he proved he was more than good enough!”

“So if I went and fucked a woman, right now, you’d have no problem with that?”

“No,” the Doctor says, but her eyes are unnaturally bright and her voice wobbles.

“Liar.”

“Clara…”

“Don’t lie to me, you hypocrite.”

“It’s not…” the Doctor took a deep breath, her eyes unnaturally bright. “Clara…”

“I said don’t fucking lie.”

“It’s not the thought of them that bothers me!” the Doctor explodes, her own temper finally fraying. “It’s the thought that they might not treat you properly; the thought that they might not look after you or respect you. I don’t care if you find someone you trust. I don’t care if it’s someone _I_ trust. But I want to be sure they’re going to treat you with the love and respect you deserve.”

“So, you wouldn’t care if it was-”

“If you say Yaz, I swear on this school, I will…”

“What?”

“I don’t know, but don’t say Yaz. She’s a bit young for you, anyway.”

Clara lets out a yelp of bitter amusement, folding her arms and surveying the Doctor with disbelief. “Like _I’m_ not too young for _you._ ”

“I’m not parading my other partner around the TARDIS every day.”

“Yaz and I wouldn’t parade.”

“Do you actually want to sleep with Yaz?”

“No, but I’m making a point.”

“And that point is…?”

“…shut up.”

“That point is…” a voice interjects, and they both freeze, suddenly realising how much noise they’ve been making. “That she’s pissed off, she doesn’t know what she wants, and she’s lashing out.”

There’s the sound of stiletto heels, and then a sharply-dressed blonde-haired woman comes into view, her hands shoved deep into the pockets of a well-cut black trenchcoat and a smirk playing over her features.

“ _You_ ,” the Doctor says at once, her eyes widening, and the woman rolls her eyes.

“Yes, me,” Quill gives a sarcastic little wave, then turns her attention to Clara with a look of absolute glee. “Hello, you vertically challenged excuse for an English teacher. Didn’t find a boyfriend in your books, then?”

“What the bloody hell…” Clara begins, disconcerted by the woman’s presence here, particularly after hours, and even more disconcerted that Quill doesn’t seem surprised to find Clara – relatively - alive. “You weren’t… the board of staff…”

“On that silly little board? No, I did ask not to be. I like my students to be entirely unaware of what’s going to hit them when they’re unfortunate enough to enter my classroom. Hello, Doctor. I do like the upgrade, but I have to wonder where you got the inspiration from. Maybe I should charge royalties?”

“Quill…” the Doctor blinks at her, still looking wholly disconcerted and – Clara thinks – a touch guilty. “What are you doing here?”

“I work here.”

“It’s the middle of the night.”

“So it is,” Quill says pleasantly, as though she’s only just noticed this fact. “You know, I could ask you the same thing. Especially since one of you is allegedly dead.”

“Clara wanted…”

“The sentimental tour?” Quill rolls her eyes dismissively. “A nostalgia trip? I bet she did. Did you like the memorial? Even though you apparently shouldn’t be on it?”

“Yeah,” Clara says in a small voice, unsure what to say. “It’s… I’m… it’s complicated. What happened to Armitage, though?”

“Oh, he got skinned alive. Don’t ask. I dealt with it.”

“He…” Clara’s eyes widen in horror as the mental image of that flashes through her mind’s eye. “What?”

“Long story,” Quill checks her watch with a flourish. “And I should probably be getting back. Thea doesn’t like spending much time with the boys.”

“Who’s Thea?”

“My daughter.”

“Your…” the Doctor looks faintly alarmed by this development, and Clara can’t blame her; a woman less maternal than Quill would be hard to find. “Your what?”

“Oh, don’t look so surprised. I thought you’d been keeping tabs on me.”

“It’s been… a difficult few years.”

“So I can tell. New body, new ship, new undead companion. Must be really difficult for you out there in space while your leftovers try to make things work on Earth.”

“Sorry, did you say _daughter_?” Clara asks, unable to keep the amused dismay from her tone.

“Yes,” Quill looks caught between embarrassment and pride, and mercifully fails to pick Clara up on her aghast stupefaction. She stands a little taller as she continues: “She starts school next year. Not that they’re going to teach her anything useful, but still… keeping up appearances and all. In her case, literally.”

“What…”

“She’s a shapeshifter.”

“This is…” the Doctor looks openly horrified now. “How did that happen?”

“Well, Doctor,” Quill smirks and takes a deep breath, and then says in a singsong voice: “When a man and a woman love each other very much-”

“No, no, no… I…” the Doctor shakes her head at once, holding her hand up for silence. “Is she safe? Is she…”

“She’s not stupid, if that’s what you mean,” Quill snaps, scowling at the Doctor as though the question alone is insulting; Clara supposes it is. “She’s never changed in public, and I’m taking precautions. She’s on Kate’s radar.”

“Kate Stewart?” Clara looks between Quill and the Doctor in confusion. “But I thought UNIT…”

“Oh, please,” Quill’s lip curls in contempt. “UNIT are finished. She joined Torchwood once her funding was pulled. She’s been good about Thea, actually. Keeping an eye on her. Said it reminded her of something about Zygons and consequences.”

Clara feels her mouth quirk into a smile, while the Doctor runs a hand through her hair with a panicked air.

“Can I see her?” the Doctor asks after a moment.

“What for?” Quill’s eyes narrow defensively. “So you can stick needles and electrodes all over her, and do science experiments?”

“No, so I can see that she’s… you know. Alright. Thriving.”

“She’s not got spikes or anything, if that’s what you mean. Thank bloody god, labour was bad enough.”

“I just… would feel better for having seen her.”

“She’s not a zoo animal.”

“I know,” the Doctor looks pained by the accusation. “Look, I let you and Charlie down. I’ve not kept up with you as diligently as I could’ve. And I want to make that right. Can I?”

“I don’t know,” Quill raises an eyebrow, looking between the two of them pointedly. “Don’t you have some arguments about polyamory to be getting on with?”

Clara flushes maroon, and the Doctor says nothing; merely meets Quill’s gaze and holds it. After a long few moments, the physics teacher nods.

“Fine,” she acquiesces after a moment’s thought, then adds: “Tomorrow, four o’clock. The old address; we haven’t moved.”

“Fine,” the Doctor concurs, and Quill nods sharply at both of them before turning on her heel and marching away.

“Hang on!” Clara shouts after her. “You never said what you were doing…”

“Security sensors,” Quill calls over her shoulder, jabbing a thumb over shoulder in the direction of the ceiling. “Nothing happens in this school after-hours without me knowing about it.”

The Doctor looks at Clara as the door slams behind Quill. “Well,” she says uncomfortably, shifting from foot to foot. “That’s very… public-spirited of her.”

“It is.”

There’s a terse, loaded pause.

“Do you really want to see other people?” the Doctor blurts, looking stricken. “Because if you do…”

“Not really,” Clara admits, letting her shoulders slump and exhaling slowly. “It’s just… you know, sometimes a bit weird waiting for you, knowing you’re with her. I don’t know what the protocol is; do I ask, do I not ask… _what_ do I ask? That sort of thing.”

“Well,” the Doctor reaches for her hand tentatively, and Clara lets her. “Why don’t we figure it out together?”

“Yeah,” Clara breathes, flashing the Doctor a tremulous smile. “Now can we _please_ go and find my old classroom? I need to know Adrian hasn’t messed the place up…”


End file.
